


Machinery

by cicadas



Category: Guardians of the Galaxy (Movies)
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Crew as Family, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Implied/Referenced Self-Harm, Peter just wants to help, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Self-Hatred, Sharing a Bed
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-08-17
Updated: 2018-01-28
Packaged: 2018-12-16 12:43:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 9,407
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11829009
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cicadas/pseuds/cicadas
Summary: Rocket is choking on implanted thoughts. Quill does what he does best. He talks.





	1. how his skin will heal

His paws are aching.

They were already rough from scar tissue and natural flesh and grit and whatever else. But they're sore, cut and crusted with blood and oils from the bottles used to lubricate the gun parts he is cleaning.

Loosen the trigger it's better to shoot than to not be strong enough-  
If they found out.

Failed to pull a trigger, failed to kill a target, failed to break the lock that first time and they caught him fumbling with the shard of metal he had concealed for so long and the next time the scalpel pierced him in that white room there was no anesthetic-

 

The humming begins then.

Quiet at first, then louder. Louder because no-one could stop him from doing so. No-one could come in with a tazer and shock him again and again until his screams turned to shrieks left over from the vocal chords of the animal they made him from.

The gun is heavy. No-one can touch him. Its parts are wired into his body. No-one would touch him.

 

In his mind, he's there. It's tangible. The table is cold and so are his legs. They've re-shaved the patches of fur that grew back, not fully, never fully, and are poking dull rods and wired ends at his feet. The blades sting. These tools ache. Deep inside his muscle, the feeling of a tooth being extracted, right at the back, where fangs flatten to molars. He knows all this.

He's been here for years.

They know he knows.

They poke anyway.

He is an it.

 

More circuitry added. A bone replaced with wire and metal and alloys and cybernetics interwoven with so much blood. So much blood. He wonders how his skin will heal over this. He wonders if he wants it to.

 

The metal is heavy. The gun parts are taken apart by his own hand. He controls it. Machinery.  
He feels a blade in his back and throws whatever he is holding into the nearest wall.  
It can't be all he is. Machinery.

He hums louder, impossible to keep his lips shut, black and thin and wet, like they are when he pulls them back over his teeth to growl, to threaten, to bite.

He needs to-

He needs to bite through his hand.

He needs to know there's muscle under there, that he's living, that he's not a fucking robot, built. Made. By others. Not his own.

He is not his own.

He is an it.

 

Someone is coming into the quarter he is occupying, he can hear it. By the sounds of the footsteps it's Quill. Fucking Star-Lord. Beloved by all. Flesh and bone and blood and _real_.

Rocket wants him to die.

Rocket wants to die.

He wonders if he could.

 

Quill's voice is dull in his ears. Whether it was because they're ringing or Quill's voice is too quiet he doesn't know. He doesn't care, frankly.

"-I'm here, Rocket. You don't need to hurt yourself to feel OK"

 

He turns to snap at the pink hands in his vision, then realises his paw is in his mouth. When had he bitten it? Why didn't he feel it?  
He knew it, he knew it, he knew it-

Machinery.

No- blood. Copper, disgust. He pulls his own paw from his mouth and tenses it to feel the burn and sting and reality flood into him and out of him. Unrestrained. Out of the white room. Real. Flesh, blood. Real. Rocket. He.

He doesn't flinch away when Quill's hands smooth the fur on his shoulders.

 

"We're all here," Quill says, and for this once Rocket lets himself believe that he is, too.

He's really here.

Alive.


	2. in the same place as before

He doesn't remember falling asleep.

He does, however, remember being picked up, ever so gently, with hands just thin enough, nails just long enough, for him to recognise as Gamora's.

He was in bed beside Groot before he had a chance to wake up properly, to threaten to bite or scratch or cause some other bodily harm. He was placed down just as gentle, and then - sleep.

 

In the morning Gamora doesn't attempt lingering eye contact. She doesn't pull him aside for a 'talk'. She doesn't offer him part of her morning meal as she used to do when trying to make something up to him. Before he snapped at her that he wasn't some orphan on Knowhere, needing to be handed shit to survive. She hadn't seemed offended. She just placed the meat back on her plate and continued eating. No more words exchanged.

The morning is the same as any other.

That's what makes him uncomfortable.

He should go. He should've gone a long time ago.  
But if he leaves now something bad will happen, he knows it. Everything has consequences, everything. Nothing is ever wholly good, but things can be wholly bad.  
He believes he is wholly bad.

He doesn't want to be.

 

 

 

The night comes sooner than he wants it to.

The others have gone to bed, this time after a couple drinks, and Rocket sits alone in the same place as before, holding his newly cleaned, newly re-wired gun in his paws.

He could almost appreciate it if he didn't want to take it apart so badly.

If he listens hard enough he can hear Quill's music drifting from his quarters, quiet but constant. It could be almost comforting. He could let it be comforting. He could.

Instead he uses a claw to pop out the cover for the wiring at the base of his gun, and he begins to work.

Inside his body he feels those same wires connect metal to his back, to his chest, to his arms, to the fingers he is using. He can feel the hum of electricity like blood flow. So loud. Too loud.  
  
Inside his head, Rocket sees each part of himself externally. On a small bench, beside the operating table, lifted with gloves and held by faceless figures. Inserted, wired, sewn. Cut, bleed, stitch. Over and over and over.  
They had finished their work with him, to begin with. Then they realised that standing to hold a gun was much easier, so they broke his back, precisely, medically, with the tail end of a block hammer. The stone end was too large for his body, he realises now. Bitter. Rage.

Inside the cage, he was a thing. Outside, he is a danger. To everyone.

By the time he realises his hands have stilled, he realises he's crying.  
He half expects Quill to show up, emerging from around a corner to place an unafraid humie hand on him.  
He half wants him to.

He can still hear the sounds of _Southern Nights_ playing, too far away.

Maybe if he let it, they would stop.

Maybe if he changed himself, it would all stop.

 

Rocket stands then, and places the tool down on the metal flooring instead of dropping it like he usually would. The crew wouldn't notice it if he did anyway. Especially not tonight, after several glasses of Malder wine and a shot of black liquid he refused to touch. That he refused to go _near_.

He doesn't let himself think too much as he presses the button that slides Quill's door open and shuts behind him.

He's-

He's allowed this. Allowed comfort. Quiet.  
Rocket tells himself this as he climbs onto the corner of Quill's bed and curls up, close enough to be warm but far enough away that he won't be accidentally touched.

Quill is snoring, deep and guttural. His face is pressed into the mattress, one arm thrown over his back, the other tucked under his stomach. A line of spit reaches from the corner of his open mouth to the dust-coloured sheets underneath him.

D'ast idiot.

Rocket closes his eyes, and lets the music overpower the whir of motors under his skin, until he can hardly hear it at all.  
The mattress beneath his fur is softer than the one in his room, and the Terran beside him is large and taking up too much space, but he's there. There's just enough room for Rocket, tucked in the V Quill has made with his body. Somewhere he fits. Somewhere he belongs.

Some part of him believes this fantasy. Some part of him knows it's not one at all.

 

 


	3. wet eyes and red scratches

_The room was cold. Far too cold._

_Somewhere far away, keys clanked against the door. Metal on metal, concrete flooring, white walls white ceiling. Cold bars, thin, then thicker as they built more and more into him._  
_Closer, a voice._

_"Did you get the Mix from the last operating table?" The voice said._

_"The Kor Mix? No, we ran out on the last subject. Had to keep pumping more in 'cause it kept waking up while we were working on its gastrointestinal system" A second voice - female, this time - said. "I hate that stuff anyway, always stains my coat black. Impossible to wash out."_

_Another sound of keys in a lock, and then the door was opening. The tall white figures walked towards the cage._

_Key. Click. Needle prick, grab, squeeze, carry. Key. Click._

_The table was freezing to the point that it hurt. They had a freezer system running underneath the metal, to automatically begin preserving organs should the subject die whilst on the operating table. Everything was worth something. Even if they lost a project here or there, the others would benefit from the upgraded insides._  
_A strap tightened around one wrist, two wrists, one foot, two feet. Nails clipped, past the quick. Muzzle wrapped tight. Tighter, tighter. Teeth punctured lips and there was blood before it had even begun._

_He could hardly breathe._

_He was on that table._

_He was an it._

_The Mix was empty.  
When the first cut was made, it felt everything._

 

 

Rocket wakes alone in Quill's bed, sweat sticking his fur to his skin. In the back of his throat he can feel spit and vomit and _disgust_ pooled there, unable to be swallowed down. He feels as though he might gag.

His back is burning where the metal plate is attached, externally, to his shoulder blades. He reaches to touch the tender area, feeling something slick in his fur. Paws in front of his eyes, he can see that it is blood. He had clawed at the left bolt, the overly scarred one, again in his sleep. Fuck. At least Quill hadn't noticed.  
Rocket looks over at the place he had curled up next to the night before and realises then that Quill isn't there. Fuck.

Taking his toes off the ground as much as he can so his claws don't sound against the flooring, he makes his way over to the small toilet stall, thankfully next to his and Groot's small quarters. Nobody sees him. Nobody notices.

The door slides open, slides shut, and Rocket makes quick work of showering the blood off while avoiding the mirror opposite him. His fingers catch on the flaps of open skin a few times and he winces as the sterilised water rushes through the open wound. Probably good for it, but not what he wants. Right now he couldn't care less if the thing became riddled with infection, he just wants to cover it with a clean jumpsuit and get out into the meal area before the gap between when Quill left the room and when he got up became too long. He doesn't want to think of what they're saying about him. He doesn't want to think about anything. He's showering.

He's being washed down.

He's being prepped.

He's-

"Rocket?" It's Quill.

Of course it's Quill.

'Fuck off' He tries to shout, gruff and mean and what they're all used to hearing, but the words don't come. What does instead is the bile in the back of his throat, finally dislodged, pouring out in a rush so bitter it burns. He makes a noise like a cough, leaning into the glass door in an attempt to steady himself, but all it does is swing open and crack loudly against the mirror.

The door to the bathroom slides open.

"Rocket, are you okay? You're hurt,"

If he could breathe Rocket would curse, swear, yell at him to get out out out out. He is panicking, though. Because he can't. He couldn't.

If he just cuts through his neck, he can breathe, if he claws it deep enough-

He feels a pinch, and hand is on him then, pink soft squishy flesh. Human. Quill. Harmless, but he wants to bite. Kill.

Kill them all, they can't touch him, nobody can touch him, kill them all.

He snaps and feels flesh tear, sharp bitter blood, then nothing at all.

 

 

-

"I used the last bandage on his back, Peter, I'm sorry. You'll have to find something else in the Med Kit."

-

"Yeah, he's awake. Don't crawl on these patches, okay, Groot?"

-

"-Don't blame you, Rocket. I don't. I'm sorry I can't do more for ya."

 

It's Quill's voice, unsteady but sure, the twang of his words hard to miss.

Apologise. He's family. (Discomfort).

Apologise.

Rocket wants to sink inside himself. Before, when he caved and crashed inside his mind, the only person getting hurt was himself.  
Now someone he - fuck's sake - _cares_ about has incisor marks in his palm and back of his hand and is saying he isn't blamed and how the fuck does that work? He's a fucking animal, lashing out at anything that moves. Anything that tries to touch.  
Anyone that cares.

Quill speaks again, and this time his voice is cracking. He sounds like he's crying. Sniff, hic, scratch of stubble against fingers. Rocket refuses to open his eyes. He can't. Can't see this.

"I'm sorry I didn't stay, when you were in my bed last night. I woke up sick, I was hungover. I should've gone back in and made sure you were okay, man, fuck, I should've been there for ya. You obviously needed help and I fucked off to lean over a toilet bowl." Another sniff, scratch. "Please stop hurting yourself, Rocket. Please." A pause "Doesn't help that we're outta bandages, huh,"

And there it is. Some semblance of normalcy.  
A joke. A shitty fucking joke.

Rocket's eyes open to slits, adjusting to the harsh light.

The room is grey, and yellow.

Beside him, Quill stops shaking, bouncing his knees and the elbows leaning on them, the injured hand wrapped in a stained shirtsleeve. Blood, not oil grease or sweat. Red, dried, real. A result of ill temper. Of bad memories. Bad someone.

Quill smiles down at him. "Hey, man. Don't tell the others I cried just now, 'kay? They're out gettin' groceries and such. Wouldn't wanna damage my manly reputation."

Rocket can do this, he can manage words right now, the d'ast idiot deserves it, if nothing.  
"Yeah. Can do."

The smile gets wider, outshining the wet eyes and red scratches on the man's chin. "Knew I was special, man,"

Rocket frowns, attempting to sit up. The bandages on his back stretch, pushing into the cut and open plate there, so he stops, not wanting to fuck up the area any more.

Quill shakes his head in dismissal, "The others've been lookin' after ya while I piloted, makin' sure Groot didn't trample all over ya while you were out - only 42 hours, before you get all worried. Told 'em to let me handle it while they went out after we landed. Good faith shines true, hey."

That's not a saying, Rocket thinks. Outwardly, he just nods, and asks, "Where's Groot?"

"With the others, being a menace, probably. I'll show him straight to ya as soon as they get in, yeah?"

He nods.

Inside, he feels the whir of motors start up again.

Black tar in his veins clogging up, stopping him from thinking.

He needs to bite something.

"Rocket." Quill's voice snaps him into attention.

"We need to talk about this...thing, that you've got going on. You don't have to go into details if you don't want, but whatever it is, how you're dealing with it...There are other ways. You can talk to us."  
A breath,  
"Or just to me, if that's what you want."

He still wants to bite.

Funny, seeing as the result of that urge is wrapped in a cloth nearby.

He avoids biting his tongue, but catches his lip, swiping over the place with his tongue to make sure it isn't bleeding. It is. If Quill notices, he doesn't mention it.

"Yeah," He says. "Okay."

"Just you, though." Rocket adds quickly.

Peter - Quill - nods.

"Yeah," Quill says. "Okay." 

They sit in silence for a moment longer, and Rocket swears he can feel himself healing.  
He'll have to thank Gamora later for the stitches.

 


	4. the bitten hand that feeds

It's been over a day.

Rocket doesn't want to be the one to initiate conversation, but it's looking like he's going to have to.

The crew is busy doing nothing, enjoying the gap between current missions. They're on a planet called Garrot, or Garroth, famous for its constant warm climate and the fruit it bears, which they have been taking advantage of in the fullest. Rocket swears the ship smells like a greenhouse. When asked, he says he prefers it to the heat outside. Every time.  
"Fur's a lot thicker than it looks," He says. It isn't. In truth, it's damaged, and patchy, and coarse like the hairs on Quill's face, rather than his head. He is not soft. He isn't happy.  
So he doesn't leave. Company won't fix what he has. Whatever it is. There's nothing he can gain by leaving the ship.

It's late in the afternoon. Gamora sits, quiet and contemplating on one of the stools in the small kitchen space. She’s been there for a while, thinking, meditating, doing whatever she does. Groot is beside her, flipping pages to stare at the pictures in a book she picked up on one of their recent excursions.

Rocket can hear her tap her fingers in threes (one two three).

The scrape of pages grates against his ears.  
Groot has been spending more and more time with Gamora, the smiling assassin. He sits on her shoulder and grips the coloured ends of her hair when she walks, or follows along behind the clicking of her heels. Mostly he sits near her elbows, or on her thigh. She’s either the most active or most stagnant of all of them at any given time. Rocket suspects Groot likes that about her most. That, and her hair is long enough to climb on.

Despite knowing this, Rocket hates her for it. And he’ll be lying if he says he tries not to.

Knowing this, Rocket hasn't thanked her for the bandages.

 

Later, in his cabin, he uses a dulled claw to scrape away a section of the paint he’d slathered over his mirror the day he took the room.

In its reflection, he sees black eyes. Nothingness.  
He should tell them. Tell _him._ He doesn’t.

In the distance, Gamora’s fingers tap on the table. One, two, three.

In his mind, the bandages are off.  
Drip. Drip. Drip.  
He wonders if rain is this poetic.

_ It isn't it isn't he isn't. _

He wants to be able to talk to Groot, like they did before. But trying that now wouldn't be fair, on either of them. Groot is a child, a baby. The thoughts in Rocket's head are poison. He wants Groot to grow.  
Rocket would never forgive himself if he hurt that process, in any way.

(Reckless decisions)

It's warm, not cold. He reminds himself of this as he gears himself up mentally for what he wants to do.  
Talk.  
He wants to talk. Needs to. If this is the way Quill wants him get the tar out of his lungs, then fuck it, he'll try.

D'ast idiot.

A paw is raised carefully, gently to his back. The bandages are in place. There are no tears. He hasn't lost his mind yet.  
Turning away from the scratch on the mirror, Rocket shakes his paw once, then places it on the comms box - second button down.  
There's a crackle of static, and nothing. Then, a fuzzy, "Yo, Rocket?"

Rocket wants to laugh at the tired, barely-there speech of the man on the other end of the line. He should, really. This isn't a therapy session, as much as Quill may try to make it one.

He clears his throat. "Quill. You up?".  
Curt, short.

A laugh rumbles through the line, "Yeah, man. I am now, anyways. What's up?"

Fuckin' lazy, he thinks.

He says, "I'm, uh. I'm ready to take you up on that offer, if it still stands."

There's the sound of Quill shuffling, fucking around, whatever he's doing, then the light on Rocket's end shuts off. The line's gone dead.  
Good. He didn't want to talk anyway-  
He's ignorant ignorant for thinking anyone would-  
  
Why doesn't he just leave? Why hasn't he left already? Why-  
  
Nothing. Nothing.

_It._

A knock. Once. Sharp and simple, on his cabin door. Then, "Hey, man, you gonna let me in or what?"

Fuck's sake, Quill.

Rocket moves to slide the door open - he'd forgot he locked it in the first place (bad idea bad idea) - and Quill steps in, wearing fleece pajama pants and the same shirt he's worn for the past three days. He's smiling, like they're about to play a thrilling game of goddamn chess, and for the first time Rocket feels a pang of pity for him.  
All the things he's seen, and he ends up having to be the camp counsellor. For a fucking animal, no less.

Quill breaks the silence like he always does, announcing he's gonna 'take a seat' on the thin cot that is Rocket's bed, and he does, heaving out a big breath as he sits. The bar by his thigh always digs into Rocket's back. It doesn't seem to bother Quill.  
  
"I know it's hard for you to talk, so I figured I might be able to do most of it, if that's okay with you?" Quill says, in a tone less joking than before. Less fun. Important.

Rocket nods. He doesn't move from his place by the door.

Quill jostles his shoulders a bit. "Well, then. Uh. I just want you to know that whatever is goin' on in your head, it ain't your fault. And I ain't gonna judge you for anything you say, even if its some shades of messed up. Cause we both know that we both are. Messed up, that is." He takes a break, a breath. "Did you wanna talk about what you were thinking when...what made you come into my room the other night?"

Rocket moves to shake his head, to say no. He stops himself. He finds himself nodding.

"Bad things?"

Again.

"Was it us, man? Maybe all us drinking-" Quill stops at the sound of Rocket's voice.

"It wasn't you, Quill." Rocket sighs. "It's not any of you. It's _them_. Inside my head, always. Telling me how I should be thinking, reacting to shit. What I should be doing to my body. It's fucking tiring. I stayed up cleaning gun parts away from you's cause I wanted a distraction you guys couldn't see, not cause...not because of you." His fingers curl up, claws digging into the pads of his paws. He lets them go.  
"I was- I was fuckin'  _made_. I didn't get to grow up and learn the world from my own perspective. I was told and taught from the moment I knew I was an...an I. If I couldn't shoot a target with precision on the timeline they wanted me to I was drawn and quartered, made better, a piece of hardwire installed the way they wanted. I'm a fuckin' animal who knows how to use a gun, Quill. That's all they made me as."

Nothing, he wants to say. I'm nothing. Nothing more.

  
"You're not, Rocket." Quill says.

Rocket's ears twitch.

"You're not what they made you to be. You're nothing like what they made you to be, man. They wanted a weapon, and instead we got a friend. To Groot, and Drax, and Gamora, even though y'all don't speak much."  
Quill rubs his head with his non-bandaged hand, probably not wanting to display it, and says, "And I happen to think you're pretty cool too, dude."

"What if I told you your opinion don't mean shit to me, Quill?" Rocket snaps.

Quill raises his eyebrows, unperturbed.

Any other time this action would piss him off. This time, however, it calms him.

"Then you would be a liar, cause my opinion is valued by absolutely everyone I know. They do call me 'Peter, He With Opinions of the Highest'" Quill says.

"Nobody calls you that."

"Well, they should."

Rocket snorts, falling just short of a laugh. Across the room, the scratch in the mirror's paint gleams back at him.  
"Your bed is comfortable." He says finally, "Mine keeps me awake most nights. I don't like to dream."

It's a whole load of meanings in three short sentences.  
Quill takes a second to process them. He says, "You know, I used to get nightmares as a kid. My Mom was in hospital, and I was staying with my Grandpa. His house smelled damp all the time, and it reminded me of the smell of her skin. How she always smelled so...sick. I'd have all these horrible, horrible variations of her...her dying, in my dreams. Sometimes they'd let me stay over in the hospital, even when I wasn't allowed, cause being near her stopped 'em. I knew she was there."

Quill clears his throat, rubs his head again. Always fidgeting. Always touching.

"I don't really move much, when I'm sleeping. Don't take up that much room, either." He says, and looks up to meet Rocket's eyes. "As long as you don't mind the music."

  
It's subtle, but it's there. An offer. An acceptance.

The bitten hand that feeds (feeds) reaching back out.

Twitches of a smile quirk on Rocket's lips. He clamps down on them.

"No. I don't."

 An offer. Acceptance.

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (i'll proofread this later.)  
> \--  
> *(proof'd)


	5. the only reason you wanna leave so bad (is me)

There’s a word for what was done to him.

He knows it in his language, the one he was taught - the one he learned, begrudgingly and forcibly fast after his meals were replaced with repeated speech sessions and sleep with small pink pills. (Once they knew he wouldn’t take them willingly, they dissolved them in his water  _(it will have to drink sooner or later)_ ). And he did.  
The word tastes the same as those pills. Tastes the same as when he first heard it and understood what it meant. (that it meant  _him_ )

He'd heard the word once since partnering with Groot. At a high-end bar on some pirate planet, drinking too much than he could stomach because he enjoyed it and he just got payed and fucked if he was ending the night by remembering the day.  
The folks around him were tall, closed-lipped and sat straight. He had sat at the bar with his back to their round white tables and chairs, hating the company but enjoying the fact that he was probably pissing them off just by being in their pristine establishment. Enjoying the drink too much to notice the topic of conversation behind him was  _science_  and  _genus_  and  _nerve_   _scalpeltoomuchmoving_ and  _'performance of such a vivisection should be supervised by at least one Officer of-'_

_ ((performance of such a vivisection-))  
_

He'd gotten Groot arrested for the first time that night. Groot had raised an arm and let Rocket crawl up him, use him as a vantage point to shoot and shoot until the word and the tongue that spoke it was dead dead burning dead.  
He let Groot comfort him for the first time that same night, too. Drunk and frightened and in a jail cell with people who bore the same face as those he'd just shot.

-

 

Rocket wakes clutching his gun, two fingers around the trigger.  He's in Quill's room, and Groot isn't with him.

Groot is small, reborn, growing, growing. Rocket is silent as he leaves. The gun is placed back in its holster in his and Groot's shared space, and Groot himself is picked up, a weight in Rocket's paws, and carried back to Quill's - slightly smaller - quarters.

When he settles back onto bed, he tucks the heavy, still-sleeping flora against his chest, shuffling back on the mattress a little to accommodate him. Quill shifts, brushing a shoulder against his fur as he moves.

Rocket hits him. Out of instinct, or annoyance. He doesn't take the time to decipher which.  


A sleepy groan rumbles from Quill's chest.

"Don't touch me." Rocket says, quietly.  He's not sure if he's talking to Quill when he says it.

Rocket moves Groot's things, wordlessly, into Quill's room the next morning.  


  
 

-

"It's not 'lame', Peter."

"Dude, it's hot and it's boring and you can't deny that you haven't coughed up at least two of those floating glowbugs"

"They're called-"

"Floating glowbugs, I know, I just told you that. That's not my point. My point is..."

It's warm, and in the Rocket stirs, head lifting from the flat pillow to try to pick back up on the conversation that had faded out of hearing distance.  
It was Gamora and Quill, out in the kitchen by the sounds of it. Their voices were hushed, level with the music playing all throughout the ship, but he could hear them well.

He sits up. Servos whine under his skin.

The bandages have started to stick to his back, causing the stitches to twinge and pinch. He knows he should move to a mirror, check to see if they're seeping, maybe even wash the fuckin' thing. But that would mean looking at it. Looking what he'd done.

What  _he'd_  done. 

There's no blaming cuts on scalpels this time claws are just as sharp-

Trying to dig out what they put in because it won't work-

 

Rocket hums. He hums loud, gravel in his throat.

In his head, he sees four faces in masks.

Their eyes are blank.

 

He zips his jumpsuit.  
In the distance, Quill is talking about him to Gamora.  
In his head, he sees them die.  
  
On the table beside his bed in his and Groot's room is his gun.

There's something wrong with him.  
_(it's him it's him it's him)_

He doesn't venture into the kitchen like he planned to. He doesn't interrupt their conversation with a snide comment, remarking that 'he has genetically enhanced hearing y'know'. He moves to the hall. He sits, takes his gun, and begins to work.

He doesn't hurt his friends.

He doesn't hurt himself.

In his head, Quill's mask is soft and fabric and blue. It covers his mouth and nose. His eyes are blank, white, nothing.

 

Footsteps barely register in his head as a real noise. Gamora says something he doesn't hear, speaks his name, and passes by. If it was a question, he didn't hear. Another set of footsteps. Stops in front of him, one foot, tapping. Rhythmic. One two three. Key. Click. Needle prick, grab, squeeze, carry. Key. Click.

Rocket already knows who it is. He doesn't look up from the scuff mark on the side plate of the gun, continuing to rub and rub at it with the pad of his thumb.  
"M'fine, Quill. Quit hoverin'" He says, and continues humming.

The tapping falters, falling out of rhythm with the song playing. Above his head, he hears Quill sigh.  
"The others are out, again. Drax likes showing Groot around, teaching him about people and weapons and all that. He's not the best conversationalist but he's enthusiastic, y'know."

He knows. Drax is loud and brash, and speaks out against absolutely everything he doesn't like. He's one of the few people Rocket doesn't hate. And Groot- Rocket wants the world for him. (has never said it won't ever say it once he cares groot will disappear)  
"He happy?" He grunts.

"Yeah. I've, uh, talked to Gamora about taking off soon. There's a possible mark on a province that's only a couple jumps away. We could probably leave by tomorrow." Quill says.

"That the only reason you wanna leave so bad? A 'possible' score?'"

Rocket puts the gun down and looks up at Quill. The man is fidgeting, fingers of his good hand twisting, mouth quirking slightly. His curly hair is matted on one side, like he hasn't even brushed a finger through it yet. He looks like a mess. He looks nervous. He almost looks like he's afraid of him.

Another sigh comes from Quill. This one is short. Huffed.

"No. It's because, well, you seem to function better when we're out. Flying, working, doing things. It's fuckin' stagnant here, man. I'm just looking-"

"Looking out for me, yes, the almighty Quill is taking the daddy role and making sure his pet don't get bored, I get it."  
The words come before he can think. Black tar. Poison, out of his mouth and into the air.

"You know, when I agreed to have a fuckin' sit-down with you I didn't think this would turn into some kinda ownership thing."

Quill starts, staring at him. "Ownership thing?- Rocket, what the fuck are you talking about, man? I thought we were on the same page here! You're not a...a  _pet_ , to me or anyone else. I just figured you wanted someone to talk to, and that being near someone at night helped with...whatever it is you get at night."

  
Blood. Disgust. His words are poison. "Fuck you, Quill! That's not what this is!"

He's horrified at himself. Underneath his eyes are wet, and he squeezes them shut. When he opens them, things are blurry. His voice is gravel.  
"You like having this edge over me, don't you? You think if you can fix my fuckin' head I'll 'owe you one', and you'll be a fuckin' angel in my eyes just like everyone else. You're wrong! What, you're not gonna defend yourself? I'm right, aren't I?"

Quill is looking at him like he wants to cry, but won't. (Fucking Star-Lord, leader of the pack).

"I'm not gonna fight with you, man. I know you want me to. But believe it or not there are people on this ship who care about you. And I'm not gonna start a fucking screaming match just cause you want me to. I need you to know we care. I care."

He can't cry in front of him he shouldn't be crying in front of him he's not better-

When they realised he could comprehend emotion they made him watch they made him watch just to mark down his reaction-

 

Rocket swallows. It feels like a knife.

"Yeah. Right. Fuckin' back down, as usual." The next breath he takes is shaky. He can feel the buzz in his lungs pulse harder and harder. Another breath.

"M'fine. Please. Just go."

 

The air is static.

Rocket is malfunctioning hardware.

Blood is pumping so loud in his ears. _here real blood pump feeling._

 

"Yeah." Quill says. "Okay."  
He walks past like it's the last thing he wants to be doing, striding in the direction Gamora left not a few minutes ago. His words are soft as he says them in passing.  
"Stay on your side of the bed tonight."

 

 

(Key. Click.)

Here. Real.

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ((((i don't know what this chapter even is. this was supposed to be a short, but then i just kept writing))))  
> ((also, i go through and fix-up fuckups on my lunchbreak at work. if you see any, they're hopefully not there for long))


	6. he (can't) can

The room is dark. Soft charcoal.

In the low light of his eyes, he sees the twitch of the leaf growing at Groot’s shoulder. The constant rise-fall-rise-fall of Quill’s chest, his hand thrown over his stomach and lifting too, like a small hill on the flat body. He notices how the bed takes up three quarters (a quarter ain’t a third) of the room.

He notices that, despite the size of the thing, Quill is on his side. Groot lay tucked under his neck, limbs splayed instead of his usual ‘curl into a ball’ manoeuvre. He’s becoming like Quill, in his mannerisms and language and attitude. Though the swearing can probably attributed to Rocket himself. He’s still going to blame it on Quill.  
The blue glow of the screen outlines Peter, giving him a -pretty- kind of glow. Makes him look young. Innocent, in the dark, where the small collections of bruises on his temple can’t be seen. Rocket makes a face at his own use of the word ‘pretty’, but decides he can’t be fucked fixing the vernacular of a thought. Quill is blocking the screen, thus the glow, and he can’t see the time. Too late, most likely too early, for overthinking on a six (five? no, six) letter word.  
He wonders if anyone looks at him and sees that word.

Beside him, Groot croaks and turns himself into Quill’s shoulder.

Peter’s shoulder.

_((no don’t call him that he shouldn't fucking call him that he’ll bleed he’ll turn on him just don’t think about it))_  
coat one coat two coat three coat gloves masks on blank eyes knife fingers glint in the bright light so white

The leaf on Groot’s own shoulder brushes against his small cheek as he moves.

The pulse is lower this time, the ache and burn as the thoughts turn into liquid and make their way through his body’s thickest veins, stretching to accommodate tar and needles. Somewhere, he knows this isn’t happening. That they can’t have done that, gone that far to torture so long after, to make sure he stayed in reminiscent pain after their blood cooled on his claws and the tile floor. He wasn’t meant to escape. He isn’t sure he is meant to be alive. But he is. And Groot is.  
Groot, who has been there for so much and remembers so little (still at this stage only time can tell). Who almost killed them and saved them all and saves them all a little each day by being there, living, reaching and breaking things and whining and eating things he shouldn’t. Groot, who he hasn't been much of a friend to in the past while. 

  
_((He has the others he doesn’t need him anymore for fucks sake he should leave leave leave-_

 

  
Rocket thinks avidly about not thinking.

He thinks about Drax’s knife on it’s own pillow beside his head. About Mantis, and her room beside Gamora’s. He thinks about Kraglin drooling in his far-off quarters. About the way spit dries and flakes on fleshy skin, but not his own. About Groot, and how he hadn’t noticed the flora’s sleep had worsened until it started getting better. About how the small lines on his face look cracked, a little dry. He’ll ask him in the morning if he’s been drinking enough.  
  
His eyes shift to Quill, snoring beside him. His hair has grown a small stretch, noticeable when he forgets to style it like he does and the ringlets at the base of his neck stay wound and pronounced. Quill calls it ‘strawberry blonde’. He used to think it was just called ‘hair’.

They had talked, earlier.

He had decided Quill wasn’t an idiot then.

 

_ "They may have made you, but they can’t make what you’re thinking right now. What you’re feeling…that’s all you. You can change it, man." _

 

He can, he (can't) can, he can.

One hand flexes and he feels the thin metal rod replacing a tendon shift, move, allow his arm to reach behind his head, feel the pillow on his skin.

He is his own.

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> .
> 
>  
> 
> non-chapter. just wanted to show rocket working his way out of agony, as its own part.  
> more to come.


	7. touched by those bodies again

He wakes to a small weight climbing over his neck. It's Groot, crawling to Peter with heavy knees. He is probably too hot again. Rocket's fur doesn't help cool him down much, but the humie; his skin is smooth, warm just enough to be comforting, not uncomfortable.

Recycled air circulates around the room, and it feels almost humid.  
They've been in orbit of a planet, something starting with Nar- or Trar - he wasn’t listening when Gamora read it out from the nav (she reads out so many updates and it became easier to just trust her and not have to look into each stop himself (just trust her)) - and have been for around eight hours. The designated daytimes are bright and hospitable, but the nights last for twelve standard hours, and are deathly cold. (cold. cold table.)  
(cold)

  
Peter had explained it all to Groot (the weather, the people, the lack of a sun-star), though Rocket knew Peter only did it because he was within earshot. Wanting to comfort him, let him know what to expect.

He hasn’t left the ship for a week.

He doesn’t think he wants to again.

(he’s made a _home_ here a _home_ they can’t take it his _home_ -)

Rocket curls his tongue, feels the small ridges at the roof of his mouth (they hadn't taken those from him), opens his eyes (like a dog, he's seen them), and rolls out of bed.

 

There's a flashcard in his brain. Each time a new word comes up, a way of explaining something he sees.  
Gamora sits on one of the stools at the round table. Orange flashcard. Round edges. White words. Her fingers are thin (fingers) and are tapping again. Always in threes. One two three.  
The air is nicer. Not covered in the scent of clothing-fabric-dirt-hair-gel. He finds it easier to breathe. The air goes through him and he is functioning again.

The flashcard flips, and the other side is green. Black image. A rod, with a small attachment on the end. Little zigzag lines, to represent the buzzing blue glow. He knows what it is, and doesn't say it. Has tried to, before, and can't pronounce the 'Z' part. His lips and tongue don't form around the letter and he's shocked for the second time within that session.

 

From her stool, Gamora looks up. (the bruise on her chin has faded to yellow and he thinks the colours aren't as nice as the ones on the humie's skin).

"Rocket. Couldn't sleep?" Her voice is softer than he's used to hearing, and he wonders if it's because the others are still sleeping, though the soundproofing is excellent (he did it himself, reinforced each door, a night of ill thoughts turned into _help_ and _good_ and _good job, thank you_ )

He swallows. "Yeah, uh, sort of. Groot woke me up."

"You were asleep before that?" (interrogative) (genuine)

Rocket has to pause. Breathe, function. Here. "Yeah." He says, because he can't stomach 'YES' right now. The glare of the orange is too bright for him to read.

Gamora picks up a small cup and takes a sip, nodding, as if she's been told something important. "Good. I'm glad, Rocket." A pause. Another sip.  
"I noticed your door was open last night"

(he can't close it it's a cage)

"Yeah, in case Groot decides he wants his bed"

(the bars are thin but strong woven so tight he can't see through)

"You both haven't been sleeping there. I thought you might be crowded with- where you sleep now, so I'm glad. I'm glad the nightmares have stopped." She freezes a little, and so does he.

(idiot idiot idiot he told her he told-)  
(glad the nightmares have stopped-)

_nightmares._

Rocket sucks in a breath through his nose. "They haven't." He says, and watches the corner of her mouth twitch.  
"They're getting better, though. And Quill wasn't meant to tell you that."

Gamora sighs. "He wants to help you, Rocket."  
The 'we all do' is unsaid, but he hears it louder than spoken word.

 

 _(he is. i know. you all do. i'm sorry. i'll try. i'm trying.)_ His claws catch on the stitching of his shorts. Cotton. Thin fabric, blue patterns. Humie-lookin clothing.

"Yeah" _(he is)_ Rocket says, and makes his way past her.

 

There's a shortage of clean cups and the kitchenette is a mess, but the water is cold and nice and makes his throat feel less like sand.

It goes down smooth (like liquor- not the time for a drink no) and settles in a little pool in his gut. A layer of something good blocking whats inside him from coming up. He feels the tar and bile and rot like a living thing and has the urge to go through one of Quill's old notebooks (schoolbooks he said, science class, the wonder of precipitation) to read through the little dotpoint-box section where it explains all the good things water does. Some good to combat the bad. (combat _him?_ ) (the idea of reading makes him want to vomit. destroy all the good thoughts by throwing them up, will he scratch his tongue to make it sting?)  


He thinks of Groot.

Growing, and living. Curled up in a position he knows babies grow in. He knows because he learned because maybe he grew that way, too, before he was he, when he was It.

 

 

He makes his way back to the room to find Quill sitting upright, hair matted on one side, rubbing his eye with a closed fist. Like a child. Like a punch.

"Ey, Rocket, man. You up?" He mumbled.

(idiot)

"Yeah, dude. I got thirsty." He presses the button to slide the door shut, and the room becomes a familiar dark. Rocket hovers at the end of the bed. (glad the nightmares have stopped)  
Quill looks at him like (glad the nightmares have stopped) he's a liar and he's (glad the nightmares have stopped). He knows they haven't.

  


"I don't know if I can sleep again." He says aloud. He doesn't know if he even meant to say it, but it makes Quill smile, so small, and outstrech one arm.

"Do you trust me?" Quill asks.

"No." Is Rocket's immediate reply.

The small smile reappears. "Good answer. You're still yourself, Rock."  
(he flinches at the nickname and hopes quill doesn't notice) (he does always does)

Rocket crawls onto Quill's side of the bed, manoeuvring himself around Groot, and sits beside the sleeping flora. The mattress is too hot beneath him.  


"So, you'll hate this if I explain it to you, but I think it'll help." Peter says, and the arm reaching out to where Rocket just was lowers, and the Terran's fingers brush his ears. Rocket wants to bite.

"Please don't bite me again" Peter says, so quiet it's a tone above a whisper, and the words cut into Rocket. It stings. In his mind, the flashcards are yellow. _'guilt' 'sad' 'hurt' 'want' 'guilt'._

 

  


Quill’s fingers brush the wrong way against the fur on his head, his ears are irritated, and the notion sets his tail out straight, a warning. But the guilt starts to dissolve, melted by (the water?) something unfamiliar, and Rocket relaxes.  
(He was pet once, by Drax, just after Groot-- after they defeated Ronin. He hadn't wanted to bite, then. He doesn't want to bite now.)

Peter readjusts, moves his elbow out from underneath him so he is lying down, and Rocket finds himself lying too. Wanting the hand to stay on his head, not wanting to break contact in case he never gets it back.   
This is a 'hug', he thinks, somewhere, on a flashcard. Intimacy was never a priority for teaching. (gun hurt kill fire burn cold hurt)

Quill's voice is a rumble, too close to his ear for his liking (don't touch me)  
"They made you." He says, and Rocket wants to die. "They didn't keep you. They don't get to keep you."

The hand on his head slows, then stops, and Rocket knows Peter's asleep again.  
they didn't keep you-  
He stares at the wall with both eyes open. Peter is warm behind him, Groot is tucked behind his head. The mattress is hot. He closes his eyes and sees their faces and masks and the glint of their scalpels, but knows he isn't there.

They don't get to have him.

 

In his dreams, the operating table is warm.

 

 

 

-

"So, where can we go to eat around here?"

Gamora's eyeroll is practically audible. They've been waiting at the locked doors of a glorified second-hand store for nearing on an hour. For each minute that goes by Quill gets more and more irritabe. He'd tried tried getting Groot to swing from strand to strand of Gamora's hair like vines, but she'd given him a look so fierce Rocket wanted to laugh.

"We will eat after we've met the proprietor, Peter. Not everything revolves around your stomach." Gamora says, and leans against the green-painted wall.

"It does, actually. I need to keep my stamina up, Gam. Gotta be in fighting form. Peak condition. How will I achieve that as a corpse?" Quill tilts his head and raises his eyebrows like he's convinced her, and Gamora just shrugs.

"I'm sure you'll figure it out."

 

The door opens twenty minutes later, and Peter (surprisingly) stops running his mouth long enough to introduce the group.

The man at the door gives Rocket a sick feeling. His skin is pale, greying, like rot, and his eyes... he can't see them under the glow of the streetlights that hang overhead. He doesn't know if he wants to. A thin hand extends, tremors, then the man steps aside waves them in.

They're led through a thin hall that smells of mildew (he can't see any plants, how could they grow here?) and something else. Something sharp that hurts his nose, like a clear spirit. They turn a corner, their host opens a dented metal door, and he finds himself standing in-

(everything is white and gunmetal grey and the table in the middle no nono there are straps and all around the shelves are covered the jars are black its inside his veins-)(white. cut. scar.)  
  
\- in an operating theatre.

There. It's not the same, it's smaller and there is only one figure and the mask is off and the cages are gone (one, small, in the corner on the way in, he noticed it he didn't want to see it.) but it's too familiar to not be that place.

He is _There_.

 

From the corner of his eye he sees Peter frown at him, but its short lived, and he exchanges it for a warm smile and a 'so what can we do for ya'

_ ('its speaking? yes, it can speak. it is excelling much faster than we thought it would. i think we can move it to the secondary chamber) _

 

Gamora's voice rings out and Rocket can hardly hear her.

"You said you had an artefact, something you would like us to deliver?" She says, curt and straight to the point as always.

If he could move, Rocket would run. He needs to run, he needs to-

"An artefact, yes." Pause. Breath. Eyes moving from Gamora to Drax like they pose a threat (they do). "I may have been vague when you asked initially what that is. For that I do apologise- but, you will be payed all the same, so it shouldn't be a problem". Pause. Breath. The light in his eyes is there now and Rocket sees they are pale blue, white-  
"I would like something of yours. The thing you will be returning is to me, and you are already in possession of it. It's wonderful how simple this all is for you, isn't it?"

The man smiles, and his teeth are black. Gamora steps forward.

"Simple, or a waste of our time? What is it you want?" She says.

He looks down, and those eyes make contact with Rocket's own. He sees it then. He wants to kill him. He can feel the motors inside hin shutting down and firing up all at once and he is choking on the wires around his throat.

 

"An unfinished project. You see my setup here it small, but it will do for just me. Me and my subject. Yes, it will do." His finger raises again. "I want it. Your animal. I want to complete it, finish my research on-"

The room seems to freeze, and Rocket is frozen in place with it.

Then theres the sound of Quill's pistols charging. It pulls him out of whatever malfunction is occuring inside him and he snaps his head sideways to see Peter's shaking hands holding two guns to the (them, hes one of _Them_ ) proprietor's head.

His voice is 'threat' and 'anger' and 'dare me dare me dare me.'

"You say that again." He says, and his voice is barely steadier than his hands. For once, Rocket feels more in control than him.

"I merely-"

Peter shoots, and the charge knocks the silver table into the wall behind it.

The glint is in Peter's eyes when he speaks. "No, no- what I meant was 'You say that again, you die." He laughs once, something low. There's no humor in it.  
"Second guessing bringing us here to fuck us over, aren't ya? How did you think this would go, really? We hand over our friend to a sick fuck with a god complex and off we go?"

"Peter-" Gamora's hand is shrugged off.

"How many were there? How many 'subjects' did you go through, huh? How long have you been tracking us to get to him? And you want us to- you want me to hand him over?"

(he wants to kill him Rocket knows he wants to shoot him just shoot him please he can't-) (function)

"Peter!"

"What, Gam?!" He turns his head just so slightly and his face is pained, like he wants to cry, wants to hurt.

"Get Rocket out of here. Take Groot. Drax and I will deal with this." Her eyes are cold. Her face is stone.

"Gam-"

"Now, Peter."

 

Peter lowers his pistols like theres a magnet trying to keep them up, and the man's face hasn't changed expression the entire time. Like it's amusing that they put up a fight. That they care so much about their friend (pet). Amused that what he helped make now means something to anyone else. Like he owns-- Rocket wants to die. He wants to die. He'd rather that than be touched by those bodies again--

There's a firm hand on his forearm, and Quill moves him, slowly, out of the room. The mans eyes pierce into him and Rocket thinks 'i'm already here im already here just leave me just leave i was made (i was made to hurt and kill just leave)

His feet aren't his own as he walks, out of the hall. He hears Drax say 'kill' and Gamora say 'cell' and 'pain' and 'right' and then he's gone, and Quill is lifting him, curling him into his arms.

(animal. finish it. animal. animal.)

Rocket pierces his claws through the thick leather of Quill's coat and grips, hold on, because if he doesn't he'll die. If he doesn't he'll be back in that room and he won't ever leave again.

His eyes sting. His throat is closed up.

The forming scars on his back begin to burn, and Rocket closes his fist so tight he feels his claws puncture Peter's skin. If it hurts, he doesn't say anything. He never does. He hides the bruises like they're uncommon and never mentions them. Rocket sees them all.

 

He tucks his head into Quill's chest, and his breath outward turns into a whine. He's crying, hot and shameful (kill him please kill them all kill them all please they'll-)

"I've got you" Quill says. Like his anger has been set aside for later, so he can comfort Rocket. Like he always has to.

Rocket lets himself believe it, for the moment. Let's himself believe he's really out of there, and Gamora will do what needs to be done. He trusts her. He wants to trust her so badly he does.

(they haven't got him they haven't got him they tried to they haven't go him)

"I've got you." He hears again, and yes, he thinks, they haven't got me.

 

(he has he has he has)

It's okay.

He tries, and he believes it, swallows diwn the bile that is rising again).

He's got him. Claws inside skin inside _living real here._

_(animal animal animal)_

 

He.

 

He's held, and safe.

 _(you want me to give him up?)_ and he didn't, and he's out of there again and again he's reminded.

They didn't keep him because his friends did.

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> -
> 
> this is the longest chapter ive ever posted.  
> i don't like the second part as it is, so i may go through and fix parts up. i just really wanted to get this out. lemme know your thoughts, if this chapter doesn't go, if you liked it etc. i like hearing it all.


End file.
